Nowendoc Public School

Brackendale Road

Nowendoc 2354

Ph: 67770905

Fax: 67770947

aides enthusiasm and inter-est and our children are very fortunate to have an abun-dance of resources to stimu-late their learning.

Our Pyjama Day, a celebra-tion of Positive Behaviour, fell at the start of our mini heat wave so we all enjoyed cool-ing off with some refreshing water play.

One of the highlights of my week was the assurance from Sue Lyon that she would continue her craft tui-tion in 2013. Sue is an un-sung heroine of Nowendoc and I value her involvement with us. Thanks heaps Sue for wanting to adapt to our ‘new Infants School’ next year.

A week and a bit to our Presentation Day Assembly and Santa visit!

Keep smiling!

This is our second last news-letter for 2012! For those interested people who have queried where “The Shout” was last week, thank you! You will remain on our mail-ing list when we reassess the feasibility of our current ar-rangement.

As those of you, who really know me, are aware I am extremely passionate about Nowendoc Public School and I am upfront and honest. I am not here filling in time, or collecting points, I am here because I have come to care deeply for the children, their parents and the staff, and the little haven of Now-endoc.

So when events happen that impinge on the welfare and freedom of our children I am distressed. This is the reason we are a week late in coming

out. I found that I could not compose my corner last week...I needed time to recol-lect, watch and observe the external happenings. I have chosen to be upfront about my feelings as I respect the Nowendoc community and wish all parties to understand that respect is paramount to the ongoing success of any positive relationship.

The children and the staff are my main priority; please re-member this when you make personal choices in our com-munity and maybe, take a breathe before acting. As our Positive Behaviour for Learn-ing system states: Be Re-sponsible, Be Respectful and Be Safe.

This newsletter aims to give you glimpses into our learn-ing at Nowendoc Public. Us-ing real and authentic stimuli

Kathy’s Corner

Mrs Worth’s Week

The Nowendoc Shout 4 D E C E M B E R 2 0 1 2 T E R M 4 W E E K 9

Diary Dates

Week 10

Friday Dec 14

Xmas Tree/

Presentation

Assembly

(see community

notices)

Homonyms are words which sound the same but are spelt differently. Lis also found many examples of homo-nyms which are spelt the same but with multiple mean-ings, such as leaves, sign and rose. An activity to acti-vate the brain! Lis wrote a tongue twister playing on word meaning, it has been printed in the newsletter this week.

Phoebe, Parker and Emily continue to work hard at reading and editing their work during writing. Parker, Emily and Phoebe are writ-ing using word prompts on various topics. Parker and Emily’s writing about cows is included in this week’s newsletter, Phoebe’s is on horses.

This week Lis has been working on homonyms.

Koala Bub Stimulus for Visual Literacy

7 Weeks Later... See How I’ve Grown

Writing

I have a favourite horse called Sally. She likes jumping over tall things.

Phoebe, Kindy

A cow is asleep in her home. The cow has a baby calf. He runs to his mum. His mum eats grass. It is raining today. “Moo” said the cow

to her calf.

Emily, Yr 1

A cow ran over to the fence fast to eat more grass. The mummy cow had a calf eating grass in the rain. The person came to milk the

cows. The cows milked ten buckets.

Parker, Yr 1

Tongue Twister Lis Bourke Yr 6

The skipper skipped with a skipping rope.

The worker worked with a working dog.

The players played with the playing cards.

The shopper shopped in a shopping mall.

The hoppers hopped into the hopper.

The sailor sailed using her sails.

The teacher teaches about teaching.

The writer writes a piece of writing.

The fisherman fished for fishes.

The speaker enjoys speaking to the other speaker.

The farmer farmed with a share farmer.

The carer carefully cared for the elderly.

See How Our Garden Grows

Phase 3 of our vegetable garden begins. Under the watchful eye of Lis; Par-ker, Emily and Phoebe planted the first of our new summer crop. This was a compromise to our little bug protectors, who have been resisting pulling the seeded crop out due to “the ladybugs won’t have a home!”

Proud as Punch

Emily and Phoebe LOVE science

Mary’s Birthday

Students Return to School

Monday, 30 January, 2012

We love Science– Slinky Discoveries

Slinkies have always mes-merised children….

What is it?

What does it do?

How does it do that?

Why? Why? Why?

Parker, being a problem solving guru threw himself into the ob-serving, questioning process until, working scientifically, he

arrived at his solution.

Liking a challenge, he then had to find out what would happen

If…?

The wonder of scientific

discovery !

What does it do when it reach-es the bottom?

Watch and see Phoebe was told…

Her face reveals the magic that comes from self discovery.

Pyjama Day - Positive Behaviour Reward

Mary’s Birthday

Students Return to School

Monday, 30 January, 2012

What Tracey and I See When Others See Play During 2012 Tracey and I have been involved in a year long numeracy project, lead by the two Leading Numeracy Consultants in DEC NSW, and involving forty two public schools throughout NSW. Count Me In Too is a targeted early years numeracy strategy, involving hands on , active exploration of numeracy. We thought this excerpt from the weekly blogging tasks would give you insights into teaching today:

We are fortunate to work in a small school environment where continuous assessment is a natural daily process. Having only 7 students (5 of which are our focus in this CMIT project) means that our homely

atmosphere ensures we are informally assessing from when they walk in the door. Our children arrive at school and play in the classroom with self selected equipment for the first 15 minutes. Duplo, Lego, con-struction equipment is a favourite and whilst they play we can observe, listen and register insights into

their numeracy understandings...eg,during their play they discuss how many more blocks are needed to complete their constructions, 'if I give you these 2 then I'm not going to have enough to finish my wall as it has to have 2 'cos the other wall has 8'. They make colour groups of needed blocks, so we can observe their one to one correspondence, understandings of equal groups, skip counting etc.They build towers

and count how many blocks they have and compare who has the highest tower etc. Often little titbits we pick up here are then acted on during our maths sessions, may be just a quick warmup to start the ses-

sion or our whole session may be adjusted to address an identified need. We use daily assessment for learning (see above as a very informal method); one to one discus-

sions/conferences, whole group which is small group too, observations during LO's, CMIT activities, indi-vidual computer activities, written activities (this is an advantage for us as with such a small group we are

often sitting with them so see or hear first hand how each child coped with each task). We know each day where each child is at and have the time and opportunities to address each identified

need...who needs more time on a concept, daily exploration/reinforcement, extension etc. We use assessment of learning which may be one on one conference, written tasks, DENS activity. SENA 1 and Best Start ( double dipping maybe but there are subtle differences) are used beginning and end of each term. These are mainly used to just reinforce and check that we are on the same page and haven't

overlooked anything and to have on file. At the end of term 3 we were doing happy dances during SENA 1 (interruptions to the process but FNWS and Numeral ID showed huge progress and it did spur the individual on for the next task). BNWS remains

a major focus for term 4. Kathy and Tracey

Hi Kathy and Tracey,

Congratulations on your great success with FNWS and Numeral ID - can just picture you doing your hap-py dance!

It really is very rewarding to closely monitor your students during a project such as this - I think we some-times miss how much learning has taken place in a short time. It is only when we are regularly measuring that we actually see the results of our work. Good to hear you are continuing your focus on BNWS this term.

As you say, it is much easier to closely track your students when there are so few. I am sure that there are

many readers of this board who are very envious of you! Lucky students at Nowendoc.

Carol (DET Numeracy Consultant - Sydney)

Mary’s Birthday

Students Return to School

Monday, 30 January, 2012

Community Notices

To the Nowendoc Community

The NSW Floral Art Association Seminar weekend in Nowendoc would not have been such a success without the help of so many of the Nowendoc Community people. Com-mittee and members who attended would like to thank, first of all, Hall Trustees, Jenny and Allan. Thanks Allan for being there when we arrived, helping us set up tables and then cleaning up the hall at the end.

Allan, hope that you took note of how to do some of the designs as we will have a Mens Only class for you the next time we come!!!

Jenny, also thanks for your help.

Sue, thanks for coming along and getting the tape measurer and sticks out to help set up the tables. This was a great help. The competitors were all impressed with the staging and set up when they came into the hall—good first impressions!!!

Thanks to Mick for coming along - several trips to the hall - to set up the screen and sound systems. This was very helpful and we thank you for your IT expertise.

Thanks to Kathy for advertising the event in the school newsletter.

A big thank you to the Nowendoc Ladies Auxiliary for the delightful lunches each day to keep our energy up.

Being able to have our meetings at the Tennis Club was also helpful so thank you to the crew there for setting this up .

Thank you to Lyn and Heather, at the Motel. It is always a pleasure to stay here, and for garden lovers, such a treat to share Heather’s garden ideas and features.

We had a fantastic trip out to the New England Cheese Farm, meeting John and Lia and the many goats, tasting fantastic cheesecake and cream (as one of our members said, “ I would give it 120%) and enjoying good cappuccino. Thanks John and Lia, for giving up your time to host us.

The weekend was rounded off with a delicious dinner, catered by Robyn at Nowendoc House and ably assisted by Sue. This was a great evening enjoyed by members.

Members came from Sydney, Grafton, taree, Queensland, Kempsey, South West Rocks, Walcha, Parkes, and Inverell.All would like to thank the Secretary of our Association, Mrs Margaret Higgins, for organising this great weekend, at down town Nowendoc. Alt-hough many members travelled far distances they certainly enjoyed this weekend in the country.

NSW Floral Art Association Committee

Mary’s Birthday

Students Return to School

Monday, 30 January, 2012

Community Notices

Nowendoc Exercise Classes

Sadly we have lost Nerina’s tuition, but we have decided to continue classes on

Tuesday mornings at 9 am.

All welcome to join.

Camp Draft

The Nowendoc Camp Draft has been cancelled due to extenuating circumstances.

Nowendoc Public School Creativity - Collaboration - Care

Visitors Always Welcome

www.nowendoc-p.schools.nsw.edu.au

Christmas Tree/ Presentation Assembly

School Hall

Friday, December 14, 2012

1.00pm

Santa will be visiting in his new transportation

Afternoon Tea will be held after the assembly so please bring a plate to share

We hope to see you there!

All welcome